The farming community of Ataso in the Atwima Mponua District of the Ashanti Region is crying out for urgent intervention as residents endure unbearable difficulties in accessing healthcare. With no clinic or ambulance service available, community members say they have been forced to turn to wooden structures, motor tricycles known locally as aboboyaa, and motorbikes popularly called okada as makeshift ambulances to transport sick people and pregnant women in critical condition to hospitals outside the community.
Residents described heartbreaking scenes during emergencies when patients are strapped onto wooden carriers and carried on foot to the roadside before being transferred onto an okada or aboboyaa for the rest of the perilous journey. The poor state of the roads further worsens the situation, making access to hospitals in Kotokuom, Nkawie, or Toase both slow and dangerous.
“We have no ambulance here, no clinic, nothing. If someone is sick or a woman is in labor and there is no motorbike, we tie her onto a wooden structure and carry her on our shoulders until we reach the roadside. Sometimes we place patients on an aboboyaa or okada, even though it is risky, because that is the only way to save lives,” one resident lamented.
Efforts to provide a lasting solution have been stalled by a land dispute. The Unit Committee in Ataso disclosed that land had earlier been secured for the construction of a Community-Based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compound. However, the project was abandoned after the community’s Odikro, Nana Owusu Adadeh, objected to the chosen site, insisting it was a cemetery. Vice Chairman of the Unit Committee, Kwame Ben, explained that appeals for alternative land have so far been denied, leaving the community’s hope for a health facility in limbo.
He has therefore called on Nana Okyere Poku II, Chief of Atwima-Agogo and traditional leader of Ataso, as well as the District Chief Executive and the Ashanti Regional Minister, to urgently intervene so that construction of the health facility can begin without further delay.
Residents fear that without immediate action, lives will continue to be lost as medical emergencies go unattended. They are appealing to government, non-governmental organizations, and philanthropists to assist the community with a health facility, an ambulance service, and improved roads to reduce the risks associated with their current means of transport. “Our mothers, children, and elders are suffering. We are begging authorities to hear our cry. Healthcare is a right, not a privilege,” another resident pleaded.
Kwame Ben reinforced the community’s urgent call with a passionate appeal: “We cannot continue to carry pregnant women on wooden structures or put patients on okada and aboboyaa just to keep them alive. We need urgent intervention now. We are appealing to our leaders to act before another life is lost.”
The situation in Ataso paints a vivid picture of the struggles rural communities across Ghana face in accessing basic healthcare. Until their call is answered, wooden structures, aboboyaa, and okada will remain Ataso’s only lifeline to hospitals.
